The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for designing device-to-device configurations suitable to be used in a power system.
As it is known, power systems for transmitting and distributing electricity from power sources to various loads and users are equipped with several types of electrical equipments, typically switching devices such as circuit breakers and reclosers, which are adapted for ensuring a proper functioning of an associated power line and of loads/users connected therewith.
To this end, the latest advancements in microprocessor-based devices and digital signal processing technologies have led to the proliferation of electronic devices, usually referred to as intelligent electronic devices (IEDs).
An IED by definition is a microprocessor-based device, typically a controller relay, which is provided with one or more communications ports and is operatively coupled to an associated switching device in order to perform various protection, control and monitoring tasks.
In recent years, the use of IEDs in power systems has dramatically increased. Since users deal with a large variety of possible network topologies for power systems, correspondingly large is the amount and variety of IEDs devised for different purposes and offered by different manufacturers to be used in each specific network topology. As a consequence, the amount of information that needs to be known and handled by users becomes overwhelming.
In particular, the configuration of each IED and of the operative relationship and coordination among the various IEDs to be installed in a network topology can be extremely difficult and would require in most cases an extensive use of engineering experts.
Therefore, it would be desirable to provide a solution which substantially eases the design of IED-to-IED configurations in power systems. This solution is provided by the method and apparatus of the present invention.